SCD Albondigas Soup

I was first introduced to this soup by my dear friend, Heather. Actually, it was by way of her mother-in-law, who is from Mexico and regularly makes huge quantities of delicious Mexican food to drop off at her children's houses. Around the time when my guy was first flirting with the SCD and had been lamenting the fact that he couldn't eat much of his favorite Mexican cuisine, I was visiting my girl in LA. When her MIL walked in the front door with a huge pot of this soup, I sensed we had a winner. Albondigas is the Spanish word for meatballs. Normally, these meatballs have rice mixed into them but all you have to do is skip that step and suddenly, you have a hearty, SCD-friendly, Mexican soup. I worked out a recipe which I make all the time and it is really delicious. We had it tonight and my husband (who is on a high dose of steroids at the moment) ate three bowls of it. Buen apetito!

1 pound ground pork
2 tsp ground cumin
5 cloves crushed garlic
Leaves from 1 bunch of cilantro
2 quarts broth
3 carrots

3 stalks celery

1 onion
2 tsp oregano
salt, to taste
olive oil

Chop up the onion, carrots and celery. Heat about 2 Tbsp olive oil in a large stock pot over medium heat and add the veggies. After about five minutes, add the stock and reduce heat so that the broth simmers. Add 2 cloves of garlic, 1 tsp cumin and 1 tsp oregano to the broth.

In a bowl, mix together the pork, 1 tsp salt, 1 tsp cumin, 3 cloves of garlic, 1 tsp oregano and about 1/2 of the cilantro leaves. This works best if you get in there and mix it with your hands. Roll the mixture into small meatballs and add them to the simmering stock.

Let the meatballs simmer in the broth for 15 minutes or until cooked all the way through. In the last five minutes of cooking, add the remaining cilantro to the soup. Add salt to taste and serve hot.